We previously had doubts in regard to the possibility to publish the tools that we created while making the game. We're happy to announce that those tools are now publicly available!
Instructions to access the tools are at the bottom of this news, but please consider reading the important notice first.
These tools also comes with a new 1.60 game update which fixes a few outstanding issues.
Please be aware: these tools were never meant to be public, we are providing them as-is, which means that you should expect very obtuse interfaces, and no technical support or planned updates to the tools. They are Windows 64bit only and can't (and will not be update to) run on Linux and macOS.
Please also be aware that this update isn't about adding a Steam Workshop support. This would require much more work and as of now, bringing the tools publicly has already been quite the work. We unfortunately can't push this further and mod support will remain "old school" for the time being.
Game editor presentation and tutorial
To help you getting into the tools, we prepared a full walkthrough, powered by our french accent.
Don't mind its length of almost 3 hours, it comes with a convenient chaptering to watch it in bursts.
[previewyoutube="F5cQBcokHYU;full"]
Limitations
Be mindful that these tools, despite being very extensive, are limited because some aspects of ScourgeBringer are hardcoded and can't really be made editable.
Here's what you can't do with the tools:
You can't create new Blessings (but you can tweak all the values of existing ones)
You can't create new Skills (but you can tweak all the values of existing ones)
You can't create new Roots (but you can tweak all the values of existing ones)
You can't create more Realms (but you can entirely repurpose existing ones)
You can't integrate new sounds or music (but we intend to publish the specs and list of sounds so that you can play around with existing ones and eventually create your own, independent bank)
Guidelines
If you wish that your mods are promoted by us, there's a few guidelines:
You are allowed to modify textures, as long as you own the rights to the modifications (we will not promote mods which use assets from other games, unless you remade them and are paying credits to the original creator). It is however not allowed to publicly share the readable versions of ScourgeBringer's assets.
You are allowed to modify the content files (BossCatalog, BulletCatalog, all the "Catalog" files). These are undocumented but we plan to document them for modifications.
You are allowed to make fan translations (but for legal reasons, we won't integrate them into the game).
Your mod should have a disclaimer that it can break the game and that the players might loose their save. Backup is highly recommended.
Open sourcing the mod itself is a nice plus, because it allows us to validate and thus promote it.
You can't:
Modify the executable, unless we can track what has been modified in a transparent way, and the process shouldn't expose publicly the game's code.
Make public any of the original data of the game.
Temper with the game sounds and music, they are encrypted.
Risk of breaking your game, check out this community tool
Our editor is super tightly coupled to the game itself and doesn't allow to made "side projects", it can only directly modify the game's core, hence possibly break the game with no way back.
BUT! The community has started working on a mod manager, ModBringer (by Squiblydoo). For now it only manages texture swapping, but this kind of manager might be the answer to our lack of time to make these adaptions to our editor. If such a tool should allow to safely backup and restore the original game files, we could think about publishing our editor to the community!
How to access the tools
The tools are not downloaded by default. You need to switch to a beta branch to download them.
Right click on ScourgeBringer in your library, select Properties. Now click on Betas, and select the "Editor" branch. After selecting it, the editor should be downloading.
You will then be able to launch it by browsing through the game's files.
Please note that the editor is quite demanding and will take several seconds to boot.
Join the modding community!
We created a modding channel on our Discord. There you can discuss mods and possible modding strategies. Some mods are already being made!
1.60 change log
New:
The code structure has been modified so that more elements can be moddable (there are still limits, but it's more open now)
Changes:
Removed analytics from the game (our server can't handle them anymore due to the number of players)
The "enter" button is now dynamically set to Cross or Circle on PlayStation 4 depending on system settings
Fixes:
Fixes "-" button not mappable on Nintendo Switch
Fixes gamepad issues when using multiple gamepads or virtual gamepads
Fixes pizza gun not working on consoles
Statement on modding
Hello Fated Ones!
We often get this question: "Is it allowed to mod ScourgeBringer? The EULA seems to forbid it."
Let's clear this up once and for good: Yes! You can mod ScourgeBringer, to some extent.
Please check below in regard to what's possible, and what isn't.
What's up with the EULA and why did it take you so long?
There's a story behind this EULA.
At first, we were willing to publish the tools that we used to make the game, and we published this EULA to protect players because we wanted to encourage clean and safe modifications and not exe hacks. This was purely for a safety reason, like preventing anyone to download modified executables of unknown sources which could harm computers or hide stuff, or simply break their game/corrupt their save. Of course not all hacks are like this but this was our way to say "we're coming up with a safe approach".
With time, it started to be clear to us that we would hardly find the time to publish our tools (they are too tightly coupled with the base game and they require a bunch of adaptions to properly support modding).
This is still very true now, and I don't think that we'll find the time to adapt and publish them. But this might change with community efforts (please check the "What's possible?" section).
So our idea was to evolve the EULA and have some tolerance, but with clear boundaries so that anyone downloading a mod knows what's inside, with ideally us validating and promoting "safe mods". This never happened as well because we didn't find the time to gather our thoughts about this and work on a more elaborated framework.
Here we are now: an non-adapted EULA, a lack of time on our side, but will to support modding.
Our proposal: we're officially allowing modding through this statement, though the EULA will stay the same to prevent malicious uses and we are going to open it up to fair tolerance when it comes to modding. In that regard, we will only give visibility to mods that are transparently safe.
What's possible?
If you wish that your mods are promoted by us, there's a few guidelines:
You are allowed to modify textures, as long as you own the rights to the modifications (we will not promote mods which use assets from other games, unless you remade them and are paying credits to the original creator). It is however not allowed to publicly share the readable versions of ScourgeBringer's assets.
You are allowed to modify the content files (BossCatalog, BulletCatalog, all the "Catalog" files). These are undocumented but we plan to document them for modifications.
You are allowed to make fan translations (but for legal reasons, we won't integrate them into the game).
Your mod should have a disclaimer that it can break the game and that the players might loose their save. Backup is highly recommended.
Open sourcing the mod itself is a nice plus, because it allows us to validate and thus promote it.
You can't:
Modify the executable, unless we can track what has been modified in a transparent way, and the process shouldn't expose publicly the game's code.
Make public any of the original data of the game.
Temper with the game sounds and music, they are encrypted.
Please bear in mind that as-is, Skills, Blessings and Chaos are coded into the executable and can't be modified through the "Catalog" files. Everything else can.
Join the modding community!
We created a modding channel on our Discord. There you can discuss mods and possible modding strategies. Some mods are already being made!
Are you going to publish your tools?
We would like to! These tools are super powerful to make new room or worlds, new enemies, new weapons, or new bosses.
But like we noted, Our editor is super tightly coupled to the game itself and doesn't allow to made "side projects", it can only directly modify the game's core, hence possibly break the game with no way back.
BUT! The community has started working on a mod manager, ModBringer (by Squiblydoo). For now it only manages texture swapping, but this kind of manager might be the answer to our lack of time to make these adaptions to our editor. If such a tool should allow to safely backup and restore the original game files, we could think about publishing our editor to the community!
In any case, it's time for some action!
Happy modding ScourgeBringer!
It’s time to add ScourgeBringer to your games collection!
It’s time to add ScourgeBringer to your games collection!
If you had added ScourgeBringer to your Wishlist months ago or if you’re looking for a nervous roguelite with a great soundtrack, the Dear Villagers Publisher Week is made for you! You can get ScourgeBringer for a fraction of the usual price on Steam! On this occasion, discover or rediscover this amazing game with a 30% discount next week!
Between March 3rd at 7 pm CET|10:00 am PST | 1:00 pm EST and 9th March at 7 pm CET| 10:00 am PST | 1:00 pm EST, we'll be holding a Publisher Week Sale. You’ll be able to expand your game collection at a fraction of the usual cost, with 30% off ScourgeBringer.
Be sure to keep an eye on the time and don't miss out this limited offer.
Have a nice week!
⚔️💥 🍕 ScourgeBringer is a fast-paced free-moving roguelite platformer. Help Kyhra to explore the unknown and slash her way through ancient machines guarding the seal of her past, and maybe the redemption of humanity.
We have just released a small maintenance patch to fix minor issues. Here are the patch notes for both 1.52 and 1.51 (which released last week but didn't get notes).
1.52
Changes:
Re-organized achievements to be displayed in a more logical order in the Nexus computer
Fixes:
Fixes Game Pass PC build crashing if Vsync is disabled
Fixes enemies activating traps
Fixes some challenges not appearing as completed in the Nexus computer if a save predates the 1.0 release
Fixes "triple" jump
Fixes accessibility settings sometime having the selection disappearing
1.51
Fixes:
Fixes Nexus computer spawning upon resuming a save despite not having found it in the first place
Daily Deal: 30% off ScourgeBringer!
Hi everyone!
One year ago, we celebrated ScourgeBringer’s Early Access release. The complete version launched a few months later and we're very proud to see how far ScourgeBringer went!
We want to thank you for your support. Your presence during the Early Access and since launch has made ScourgeBringer an amazing experience!
To celebrate this anniversary, we decided to give all of those who have yet to join this adventure the chance to get this incredible game at a low price.
For the first time since its release, ScourgeBringer is 30% off for 48h! This is the perfect time to discover this fast paced rogue-lite!
Update 1.50 is out!
Hello Bringers!
The newest update for ScourgeBringer is now out of beta and available to every players!
Welcome to update 1.50!
This update packs a bunch of new features targeted to improve your comfort while playing. Let's check this out!
We heard out loud players who are having a rough day with the challenges of ScourgeBringer. We revised how the difficulty works in the game with a new adaptive difficulty system.
This new system is enabled by default for all players (but can be disabled) and will automatically scale down or up the difficulty based on which Realm(s) you are struggling in or successfully clearing. The idea of this system is to follow the players in their progression more smoothly up to being ready for the Chaos Roots.
This system won't make the game harder than its base difficulty, and it will always be disabled in the Chaos Roots, which is where the intended true challenge is.
Our goal is to empower players into finishing the non-Chaos Roots runs with more immediate fun, while keeping the hot sauce for the Chaos Roots.
If such a system doesn't speak to you, you can freely disable the adaptive difficulty in the accessibility settings. This will bring the game back to its unattended difficulty.
Achievements menu within the Nexus Computer
The Nexus Computer now has a menu dedicated to keeping track of your achievements. You can even have custom achievement notifications in-game (which can be enabled from the settings).
This is update is mostly targeted to platforms where achievements are not available, but for added value we kept it in the Steam version and added the achievements to the overall progression percentage.
Please note that the achievements do not synchronize with your actual Steam achievements. They are bound to your save data, and limited to achievements unlocked before the full release of the game (before v1.40). If you unlocked achievements during the Early Access, they will now appear there automatically.
Stats menu within the Nexus Computer
The Nexus Computer also got improved with a small stats screen which keeps track of your play time, run count, and other aggregated data.
Saving during runs
You can now "Save & exit" during runs!
Enjoy playing ScourgeBringer in smaller sessions, or manage urgent matters without loosing your un.
Please note that this new save system if not resilient to crashes and ALT+F4'ing. In those cases, the game won't save your run to continue it later. You have to manually select "save and exit".
Fair warning: if you save during a combat, the game will remove 1 HP from your save when loading it. This is to prevent exploiting the save/load to cheese the game. If you save outside of combats, no penalty will be applied.
Quality of life improvements and more settings
We added a few things here and there to improve your stay within the ScourgeBringer.
For instance, the Nexus Computer now display in which Realm you can find specific computer logs.
We also added a confirmation before interrupting a run so that there are no more miss-clicks.
There are new options in the settings:
Music style: you can now choose your preferred music style and disable the dynamic music system;
Achievement notifications: you can disable/enable the built-in achievement notifications;
Adaptive difficulty: the new difficulty system can be disabled/enabled in the accessibility settings;
Reduce flashes: we added an accessibility setting to disable full-screen white flashes (in addition to also dampen the flashing effect on the main menu background laser).
And beside these changes, we fixed a few issues (e.g. the splat-flies getting stuck) and made some slight re-balancing (e.g. cross-grenade has been nerfed).
We hope that you'll enjoy this new update!
Let us know what you think of it.
Have fun, Thomas
Full patch notes
New:
We introduced a new adaptive difficulty system which will scale with the skill of struggling players. It can be disabled in the settings (and will always be turned off when playing from the Chaos Roots)
Achievements menu accessible from the Nexus Computer and notifications for platforms which don't support achievements
Stats menu accessible from the Nexus Computer
You can now save during an ongoing game and resume it later on
We added a new music option to select your preferred style of music (Dynamic, calm music only, or battle music only)
There is now a confirmation before exiting, restarting, or returning to the Tree
The Nexus Computer will now display in which Realm you can find specific Expedition Logs
We added an option to reduce white fullscreen flashes
Added support for Xbox Series and PlayStation 5 controllers (Game Pass version is limited to Xbox controllers)
Changes:
Peppy will now come to help even if the players already beat the 5th boss (except when playing from the Chaos Roots)
Secret rooms are now more likely to spawn in spots where they have the most neighbors
Smashing enemies into Realm 6 traps will disable the traps
Increased the visibility of secret rooms and made it so perfectly smashing enemies/bullets trigger a more visible hint
Removed flickering from the main menu animation
Back button can now be mapped on Xbox One
Slightly changed the Primordial Ignis to be more visible with total color-blindness
Reworked how explosion damages so that weapons such as the cross-grenade deal more consistent damages (cross-grenade has been consequently nerfed)
Upgraded our engine for general performance and stability improvements
Fixes:
Fixes secret room count sometime not following the rule of "always one secret room, or two if there is only one shop"
Fixes World 3 green drop decoration getting out of sync
Fixes some World 6 bullets not cleaning after a battle
Fixes Plasma saw-bot sometime disappearing for one frame when smashed
Fixes Initial Bomb not dropping items
Fixes Splat-flies getting stuck into walls (and possibly hidden in green smoke)
Fixes spawning enemies being affected by the Tranquilizing mod
Fixes a rare crash
New year's update
Hello Bringers!
We hope that you had a good end of the year if you are in a part of the world which had holidays! We are, and we fully recharged our batteries!
We left last year with a beta update, without knowing exactly when it'll release, so here are some news about!
The update is basically finished, but we can't publish it publicly just yet because we are still waiting on this update to be localized (there are 12 languages to consider). We sent the update to localization mid-December, but due to the holidays, the localization team couldn't ship promptly, which is fair and normal. We already have Chinese, Japanese, and Korean localizations for 1.50 and are expecting all the other languages real soon now.
As soon as all the localizations are in the game, we will publish 1.50! We're hoping for the first half of January.
Consoles will be updated a bit later because of certification processes (depending on the platforms, it usually takes up to 2 weeks once a patch is completed).
Thanks to you, we're in the TOP 10, and in very good company among other games like Hades, Among Us, or Mount & Blade 2! Quite the achievement!
Thank you!
A change in Flying Oak Games' pace
As you may, or may not know, Flying Oak Games is a very small company and the slightest event might impact our work pacing.
This includes happy events, like Florian, the pixel artist on the team, just going dad (for the second time)! Florian took an official parenthood vacation to adapt to this event. :)
This means that possible future developments on ScourgeBringer will be slowed down, except for the 1.50 update which is completed and that I can fully handle alone on all platforms. We'll keep you updated anyway. :)
That's it for the latest news! Talk to you soon with the 1.50 release!
Cheers, Thomas
Vote for ScourgeBringer for the IndieDB awards!
Hello Bringers!
We are glad to be nominated for the Platformer category this year for the IndieDB Indie of the Year 2020! If you enjoy ScourgeBringer & you want to support us by voting for the game, we would be very grateful!
To vote for us, you need to go to this page here then click on the Platformer button in the “Released games” category & click on the “vote” button next to ScourgeBringer.
You have 2 days left to take part in the vote if you want to support us!
We also want to take the time to wish a great holiday season to everyone in our awesome community. Have a great time with your friends & family if you celebrate it with them & see you in January for more ScourgeBringer news.
Take care!
1.50 Update BETA available
Hello Bringers!
We previously discussed plans to update ScourgeBringer beyond its full release in this post. More specifically, we detailed our short term intention to release a comfort update.
This work is now pretty much done but we need some feedback before it all goes public.
Hence, we just published v1.50 (aka The Comfort Update), on a beta branch on Steam and accessible to all owners.
This update focuses on polishing some more the base game, like the difficulty and some quality of life improvements (there is no new content, for now).
Please mind that this beta is only fully translated in English and French (other languages are playable, but you will witness some MISSING_STRING here and there because the update didn't go into localization yet; we are waiting to make sure that things are stable before sending it out to localization).
Back your save!
Before venturing into the beta realm, we would like to highly encourage you to backup your current save, just in case.
Things should be smooth and no save corruption is to be expected, but better be safe than sorry if we missed something damaging.
To backup your save data, please check this forum thread and backup the 0.sav file somewhere else safe on your computer.
Accessing the 1.50 beta
To access to the 1.50 beta, you will have to first enable the beta branch with a password. Here are the steps:
Go to your "Library";
Right-click on ScourgeBringer (providing it is already installed), and select "Properties";
Click on the "BETAS" tab;
In the text field saying "Enter beta access code...", type PUMPKINPIZZA;
Click on the "Check code" button;
In the dropdown menu just above, there should now be an option "beta - Beta testing branch" that you should select.
The 1.50 beta should now be downloading automatically!
Here's a gif to visualize the activation steps.
To opt-out of the 1.50 beta and go back to the stable game, simply select "NONE" in the dopdown menu on the "BETAS" tab. Your save file should hopefully work without issue with the base game without any manipulation.
What's new?
Adaptive difficulty system
We heard out loud players who are having a rough day with the challenges of ScourgeBringer. We revised how the difficulty works in the game with a new adaptive difficulty system.
This new system is enabled by default for all players and will automatically scale down or up the difficulty based on which Realm you are struggling in or successfully clearing. The idea of this system is to follow the players in their progression more smoothly up to being ready for the Chaos Roots.
This system won't make the game harder than its base difficulty, and it will always be disabled in the Chaos Roots, which is where the intended true challenge is.
Our goal is to empower players into finishing the non-Chaos Roots runs with more immediate fun.
If such a system doesn't speak to you, you can freely disable the adaptive difficulty in the accessibility settings. This will bring the game back to its unattended difficulty.
Achievements menu within the Nexus Computer
The Nexus Computer now has a menu dedicated to keeping track of your achievements. You can even have custom achievement notifications in-game (which can be enabled from the settings).
This is update is mostly targeted to platforms where achievements are not available, but for added value we kept it in the Steam version and added the achievements to the overall progression percentage.
Please note that the achievements do not synchronize with your actual Steam achievements. They are bound to your save data, and limited to achievements unlocked before the full release of the game (before v1.40).
Stats menu within the Nexus Computer
The Nexus Computer also got improved with a small stats screen which keeps track of your play time, run count, and other aggregated data.
Saving during runs
You can now "Save & exit" during runs!
This is the change that is the most prone to bugs in this beta, and the actual reason we need feedback. If anything feels off when resuming, please share your feeling with us.
Please note that this new save system if not resilient to crashes and ALT+F4'ing. In those cases, the game won't save your run to continue it later. You have to manually select "save and exit".
Quality of life improvements and more settings
We added a few things here and there to improve your stay within the ScourgeBringer.
For instance, the Nexus Computer now display in which Realm you can find specific computer logs.
We also added a confirmation before interrupting a run so that there are no more miss-clicks.
There are new options in the settings:
Music style: you can now choose your preferred music style and disable the dynamic music system;
Achievement notifications: you can disable/enable the built-in achievement notifications;
Adaptive difficulty: the new difficulty system can be disabled/enabled in the accessibility settings;
Reduce flashes: we added an accessibility setting to disable full-screen white flashes (in addition to also dampen the flashing effect on the main menu background laser).
And beside these changes, we fixed a few issues (e.g. the splat-flies getting stuck) and stuff.
We hope that this update will improve everyone's experience. :)
As soon as we have the localization done and are sure the update is stable, we will publish it publicly to every platforms!
Cheers, Thomas
Please consider voting for ScourgeBringer for the Steam Awards!
Hello Bringers!
We really appreciated all the support you gave us during the early access & since the release. Thank you to our wonderful community for helping ScourgeBringer get better than we could have imagined. We also really appreciated the great reviews coming from the press & players since the release.
It has been a great motivation for us to continue working on the game to make it better & better!
If you enjoy playing ScourgeBringer, we would be very happy that you consider nominating the game for the Steam Awards!
Since we can only nominate the game in a single category, we think that the “Best game you suck at” would be the best match. But if you think we fit more in other categories, we would be glad that you vote for us! Joke aside, we’re working on a 1.50 update to smooth out the experience for new players.
More info on the incoming 1.50 update here: https://steamcommunity.com/games/1037020/announcements/detail/2895213456461512312
We know 2020 has been a great year for games, so we would be very grateful if you vote for us, thanks for your consideration!
PS: While waiting for the incoming 1.50 update, keep practicing... on the game! Don't reproduce at home!
